The adventures, stories, and inspirations of Sister Jaynanne Petersen while serving an LDS mission to Vancouver, Canada, as recorded by her mom...

Monday, July 22, 2013

5 Months and Still Going STRONG!!!

Hey hi Yo! I CAN'T BELIEVE SPENCER GOES TO THE MTC NEXT WEEK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ahhhhhhhhhh. That is just so so so so so so so crazy. How is he doing?! Is he living it up while he still can?! jk you can live it up in the Czech, baby. I hope he got my letter. Spencer I love you. I am so proud of you. Words can not describe how proud I am of you. You are such a great example. ya give me strength to carry on every day. Trust in the Lord. Work iT. Nuff Said.

SO can you believe that I have been out for five months!?! how crazy is that?! I just couldn't believe it. Like, it goes by fast when you don't think about it, but in other ways..it goes by so slow! The key is to stay focused, and positive, and busy. The days are long, the weeks are short (kinda) and when you get a month down you feel like a champion!!!

Mom I got the rain coat you sent me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ahhhhh. I love the color! Thank you so, so, so, so much! You wanna know something funny though..... it's the exact same coat as the stinky one! like, exact same, but different color! ha I was like, nut-uh! ha and it kinda sorta really big on me.. so I'm not sure what to do.. I mean it works and I can put it over my black coat maybe, but yeah.

Tomorrow we are having a Zone Conference so hopefully if You sent anything to the office, I'll be able to get it! yip yip! <-- like on air bender..oh appah. haha anyway! So, this past week was pretty good! We weren't able to see Moroni's quest, but I heard it was amazing! Yesterday at church, they just had the youth bear their testimony about it and it was so powerful. I was so touched. All the adults just went off on how amazing the youth were and it made me kinda get homesick for my North Ogden First Ward Youth. Then I started thinking... bad sign I know... and I'm not a youth anymore. When I thought about that, well it was just really hard. It was the first time in my life when I didn't know where I fit in. Like I can't explain it. I just felt weird. Like, I'm too old to be in Young Women's, but I'm not really in Relief Society right now cuz of the whole mission thing and it's just weird. I don't know what my role is at age 20. (when I'm 22 I'll know cuz of t-swizzle, but right now I'm like huh?) I know my missionary role, but other than that, I just don't know. I'm not talking future crap though because I never worry about that kinda after-mission stuff cuz I don't need to worry. I'm just saying that I felt really small in this big plan. I don't have time to analyze or get insecure about it though, so, oh well. I guess I'll just.. yeah.

So, there is this old lady in our ward who told me I always say that people (like her) are so sweet so now she calls me Sister So-Sweet! haha isn't that funny? I was like, you are a nut!

So, last week we went on exchanges so I went to Langley YSA for the day and I was comps with this new missionary names Sister Weller and we had so much stinking fun. Like we drove to Abottsford for an appt cuz YSA covers everywhere, and we took the wrong exit and ended up getting SO SO lost. We drove around for like two hours trying to find our way in this city that neither of us have been in and it was the biggest joke. See Brookswood uses numbers so it's so much easier to figure out. Abbotsford is just a bunch of Street names!We were laughing so hard the entire time. Like we were just cracking up at everything. every five seconds I would pull over and we would try to read their map, that has completely fallen apart, and it was just so funny. What a nice stress reliever. I haven't laughed in a while! ha it was so great.Well during all of this, MY eye was just irritating me like crazy. Come to find out, I GOT PINK EYE! what? yeah random right? and the thing is, I have washed my hands and used hand sanitizer so much cuz Sister Gale is all about getting rid of germs so it was so unexpected.So thenSister Wellerand I were just laughing even harder because there was like goop coming out of my eye and it was so gross and it was all red and I could barely see and we were trying to teach someone with ADHD and all she kept doing was looking at my eye and commenting on it and it was just ridiculous. So we ended up going to the pharmacy and getting drops. I'm all better kinda. Still red but no goop. So it's a glasses kinda week if ya know what i'm saying!

I don't know why I keep getting sick. I think it's God's way of telling me or well making me slow down and TAKE IT EASY cuz I just want to go go go and I am trying to be this over achiever and it's not working out so well. I don't want to slow down tho! ahh. so frustrating. Too much depends on me. I'm learning to slow down and have patience with Sis Gale tho, cuz she isn't speedy, cuz she is new and she doesn't know what's really going on. She is just this nervous little thing and super bashful. I know she got put with me because she has no confidence really so I just love her and encourage her. But really though.. Training in Brookswood is easy cuz I know the area SO SO well, but trying to teach someone who is quiet and tired all the time is hard. I do lots of the talking. I try not too, but she won't, so someone has to say something or gets real awkward.

Anyway, I want to tell you a story about this investigator we are teaching. He is so solid. LIKE SO SOLID! He doesn't have a baptism date, but I feel so good about him. He just married this inactive older lady in our ward and he wanted to know more about her faith, so he got on mormon.org and requested missionaries. Well, we met with him two weeks ago at the church and taught him the Restoration. It was kinda a crazy lesson cuz we started really late, cuz we were waiting for our female member present, but it went well in the end. Well Last week we taught him the Plan of Salvation at the church and his wife came. The lesson was SOOOO powerful. He had already read all the way up to 1 Nephi chapter 5 because he couldn't sleep and something told him to read. He loves it. That is a miracle people! like others do not read that much! Only Karen ever did. He is golden. So during the lesson, I was asking him these inspired questions (cuz i was basically teaching the whole lesson myself) and at one point he said that his wife was telling him about the Celestial glory and how the only way to get there with her is through the temple. Well, tears filled his eyes and he expressed to us that he wants to take his wife to the temple so that they can be together forever. It was so moving. We were all crying and the spirit was so so strong. He loves her so much. It's beautiful. So we invited him the second time with a date to be baptized, and he wasn't sure, but we are all going to pray about it.We had his wife say the closing prayer and in it, she thanked God for helping her come back and rekindle what she knows to be true and she thanked us for helping her feel the spirit again in her life. It was a great prayer. So they both came to church yesterday and they just fit right in. Like it just worked. They looked like they already belonged. It was great. We are seeing them again tomorrow at their house so please please please pray for him and pray that he can get baptized SOON. The adversary is gonna work on him the more he discovers the truth. Please pray. Please. I beg of you. It's people like him and moments like that, that help me to keep on going.

The church is real and true. I love my Savior Jesus Christ with all my heart and I am forever grateful for the atonement. I would be lost without it. The Lord is my rock and I am so happy that I get to be a missionary for Him. I want you to know that I know that Book of Mormon is true and I encourage you to just read it. If my investigator can, I know you can to. It's the most correct book of any other book on this planet. I know Joseph Smith translated it by the Power of God and I know that he was a true Prophet. I know that Thomas S. Monson is a true Prophet and I love him. I will go where the Lord wants me to go and I will be who he wants me to be, because I owe it to him. He is my Savior and My Redeemer.

Well, have a great week everyone. And, I challenge you all to bear your Testimony next Sunday. I know it is scary and nerve racking, but the Lord is on our side so we need not fear!

Remember that by small and simple things are great things brought to pass. Be strong and of Good Courage. Work iT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 1-10-15 five stars!LOVE SISTER JAYNANNE PETERSEN